Rhizo-Nexus

The concepts of earth and ground were first examined under the principles of earth and earth philosophy and pre-conceptual readings were carried out.
According to Heidegger, the universe should be examined from a four-fold perspective and these are mortals, immortals, earth and sky. Heidegger develops his philosophy through existentialism. And within this four-fold, he explains that mortals approach the earth with the drive of the concept of dwelling. While existence is internalized with the concept of dwelling according to Heidegger, Deleuze interprets existence as “Pure immanence requires equality of being as a principle”. By inference, existence cannot be compared in existing earth. Everything exists equally….
Deleuze and Guattari explain that the earth is constantly becoming deteritorilized and is part of a movement with the movements of those on it. They state that the soil is a body without organs, and that it can be explained by the fact that it creates constant nomadic entries and exits and exhibits flows in all directions. The flow here carries parts of both chaos and harmony within itself. This mobility is similar to a RHIZOMATIC CONNECTION. Deleuze and Guattari's concept of Rhizome, that is, the rhizome, is a structure of multiplicity that establishes infinite connections between heterogeneous things. In short, the Earth is part of a continuous movement and flow together with a rhizomatic network and the living beings on it. In the context of this dual movement, everything in the body without organs also seeks its place, a ground where it will establish a kind of rhizomatic relations.
In this context, the rhizome is horizontal. It establishes infinite relations with laterality and crosswiseness on a heterarchical plane that does not progress with hierarchical divisions. and all members on the rhizome are connected to each other with infinite ties.
The basic principles of the rhizome are to establish connections, create multiplicity, be heterogeneous and assignifying ruptures. The Gediz delta can be seen as a natural area for Turkey and Izmir, where relations are established under the principles of the rhizome concept and where the rhizomatic connection system between them can be seen. The antithesis of the rhizome is the opposite of the arborecent thought, which progresses hierarchically, infiltrates the natural soil that establishes rhizomatic connections, causes it to change, destroy the nodes and break the rhizomatic connections. This can also be seen with the negative environmental changes in the Gediz Delta and its surroundings. So what are these changes and rhizomatic relationships in nature, what can we take as nodal points, what creates the connection? In order to make this rhizomatic reading and to make sense of what the concept corresponds to in the field, the concept of rhizomatic learning, Connectivism, makes it possible to read this natural area. Connectivism is related to the process of making sense of information by establishing connections on networks. According to the connectionist approach, almost everything can be a node. The coming together of nodes forms the network. The network formed by the coming together of nodes can be the node of a larger network.
In this context, each object in nature, living or non-living, forms the nodal points in the rhizome, while the connections describe the actions and interactions.
With this concept, rhizomatic readings have been made at different points in the Gediz Delta. For example, while the sand dunes in the Homa lagoon located in the west of the area establish a habitat relationship with salicornias, these areas create a breeding and living area relationship for Dalmatian pelicans. The pelican's relationship with the water, the mullet, lidaki, sea bass fish that it establishes for feeding purposes, and the food relationship that the fish establish with the 63 types of plankton in the Homa lagoon, the earth creates a context and causes the Homa lagoon to exist rhizomatically with this richness it provides within itself. However, the increase in the salinity of the water and the decrease in the fish population due to excessive fishing cause the ties to break and affect the entire network. However, while there are Ramsar Convention on Wetlands ,nature and wild animal protection boundaries in the area, these continue to be done secretly. The same examples, the hierarchical positioning of the Menemen leather industry zone and the villa city on the rocky hills destroys the vegetation, causes the birds to leave the area and destroys the rhizomatic connections formed in the earth.
In Çamaltı saltery, the salt plant disrupts the salinity of the water and the wastewater plant dumps its sludge waste into the marshes, causing the layers of the soil to deteriorate and the rhizomatic relationships to break. In Çiğli marsh region, the organized industrial zone pollutes the marsh and the relationships undergo destructive ruptures.
Against all these destructive ruptures, disconnection, hierarchical stratification and node point degradation, concepts such as connectionism and rhizomatic heterarchy create an attitude, while a process and scenario series developing through this activity is created.
In this scenario, the decrease in the bird population in the Gediz Delta in the coming years is reflected in the reports and as a result, the actions that make a splash and grow in İzmir begin. As a result of these actions, the government area It is agreed that all factories within the border formed by declaring it a heterarchical region and moving the river borders of the wetland by 50 meters will be determined and moved to the back areas of the industry. One year after the decision, living creatures start to be seen again, but their numbers decrease and their habitats deteriorate. When the reasons for this are investigated, it is realized that the endless rhizomatic connections between the soil and living creatures are disrupted by the hierarchical capitalism. For this reason, habitat extensions where certain creatures can establish potential relationships are determined in the Gediz Delta and the Rhizonexus system, which settles along these habitat extensions, spreads by leaping into problematic areas throughout the Gediz Delta and aims to repair the bond disruption and ruptures in the chaotic and rhizomatic structure of the natural earth. It aims to first destroy and ensure that the hierarchical factors that break the bonds with habitat rhizomes throughout the settlements and then to keep the rhizomatic connections of the area alive. In this way, the Gediz Delta is gradually surrendered to the natural earth. This construction process was taken as an architectural representation of the 5th step of the scenario process.
In this sense, a structure that RISES LIKE A RHIZOME by clinging to both sides of the stream at a point where the Gediz River meets the sea, which holds the weight of the system, is designed as a nexus matrix and weaves itself on the water, sometimes touching the water, sometimes rising into the air and becoming an observation tower, and sometimes rising again as a part of
the bicycle route and watching the birds. A structure that repairs rhizomatic relationships by monitoring the movements of living beings that take samples from the soil and water, and in this sense, where each unit is in flow to the other units and the user constantly encounters spaces where empathy and paradigm change can be created with these rhizomatic elements throughout these flows, has been created. As can be seen on the ground floor and in the sections, it is possible to enter the structure from the river towards a series of different laboratories focused on water -animals- plants- soil and machines that clean the water in the approach from the industrial zone. The route shown in orange is a visitor experience route, this route creates a circulation that goes around the inner space of the structure and visits all closed spaces. The experience circulation created for this city dweller first creates a route that extends to machines, then sample laboratories, data reading workshops, data bibliography and the bird observation tower at the lowest end. In the 8.50 plan, the connection reading offices and data reading workshops are connected, while the delta observation tower is reached at the highest level. In the plan, the extending mass on the left is the mud islands laboratory, while the right arm rises above the industrial zone and works as an observation tower that offers a view.The osmosis machines that take dirty water from the river wastewater discharge clean water to the necessary arid regions and ensure the continuity of the rhizome in the earth.With all these functions, rhizonexus repairs the rhizomatic deteriorations in the natural earth and ensures that Gediz exists rhizomatically again…

Student: Berk Özden
Supervisors: Assoc. Prof. Dr. Ebru Yılmaz, Assoc. Prof. Dr. Ülkü İnceköse, R.A. Ceren Ergüler